“Emile!” Alexandra rebuked her uncompromising husband. “These souls are only trying to help.”
“I don’t their incompetent help! Their so-called help has given The Singulate even more power for their demented plans. The ineptitude!”
“Emile Petrovic! You listen to me. If you continue to behave this way toward these good people then so help me I’ll leave you, I swear. Remember our vows? Until death do we part?”
The silence was a deafening bugle call of defeat, or victory, whichever way one looked at it. Rev couldn’t let it end this way.
“I can assure you both we will get you out of here. This is a temporary setback, I promise. I just have to find a way—” he searched the walls for a permeation point once again, some fine membrane he could squeeze through. Nothing. His desperation mounted. He contemplated navigating the maze for a different egress point, and that thought numbed his mind again. It was like an endless circuit board. Then he remembered who loved circuit boards…Ruby.
He heard tinny squeaking. He knew that sound. It was Ruby in the midst of some grand game, a frantic and animated gymnastic chess match she was bound and determined to win.
He was right. Ruby was with them in that death row of souls. She was listening to everything the others were saying. She just didn’t have the time or the desire for conversation. This place, this limitless labyrinth with its constant, zigzagging repetition, was nothing more than a computer. She loved navigating computers.
She went about the business of her business, and forgot about her fear of what exactly had created such abominations of nature. Those thoughts were exorcised like demons, and now her one and only goal was complete knowledge of the inner workings of these apparatuses called soul snares.
These things weren’t inherently evil. It was merely how they were being used, and who was using them. Simple wires and semiconductors. Of course there were the magical components. Haitian vodou, African JuJu, Egyptian Heka, Ars magica, Shamiram occultism, Hebrew Kabbalah—she sensed influences from all of those and more. She’d heard of them before, and she’d dealt with them before. Just not in conjunction with this type of technology. But up close, when she shed her fear, figuring out the riddle and navigating the labyrinth became quite easy.
Before anyone knew it, Ruby was free.
“Ruby?” Rev sensed her presence somewhere near. “Ruby, that’s you, right?” He had to ask just to be sure.
Ruby, still shaken from the experience, squawked instructions at Rev, urging him to escape his snare like she had. Rev understood what she was telling him, but no matter what he tried it still didn’t work. He begged her to enter his snare and lead him out. That only made her even more anxious, but she told him she was willing to give it a shot.
Before Ruby got the chance, the sound of footsteps on the loamy ground put a halt to everything. Rev and Ruby fell silent, uneasy about their new visitor. Who was it? Hatman? They had to be careful if it was him.
A voice called into the darkness, a voice which set Rev at ease the second he heard it. His usual ability to probe into the ether and read this person’s mind was jammed by the spirit snare. He was blind in there, but not deaf. And the voice he heard was like a beacon in the night.
“Rev? Rev, are you okay?”
“Katherine,” Rev responded, though it took quite a bit of energy to do so. “What are you doing here?”
“I can’t—” she sounded miserable. “I just can’t let them do this do you.”
“Then you know what your dear leader Hatman is doing, don’t you?” Rev couldn’t contain his anger. “You know he’s planning to use all these souls as his energy source so he can gain control of the forces of darkness. You know he plans on using those forces to destroy life on this planet as we know it. You know all these things and yet you’re still going along with it all?”
“Yes,” Katherine said. “I know about everything. But I’m not going along with it.”
“What?” Rev wasn’t sure if he believed his spectral ears. “You mean you didn’t come down here to taunt me? To rub it in?”
“No!” Katherine was in tears. “No, I never wanted any of this. When Ron and I joined The Singulate we were young and idealistic. We thought we could change the world. But then we learned the truth. The real truth about using the energy from spirits to power Hatman’s terrible machine.”
Katherine’s words were muffled by her sobbing. She couldn’t control her emotions, and Rev was the reason why.
“I thought I was going to be able to handle this. I thought I was going to be strong. But I can’t do it. After meeting you, I just can’t.”
Before Rev had the chance to talk some sense into this woman, before she threw away every bit of her own security for a ghost she barely knew, he felt something strangely liberating. He couldn’t quite describe it. He could only liken it to the particular experience of being alive and plucking a sliver from his skin. That’s what it felt like, a painful sensation followed quickly by one of relief.
The initial shock was one of rapid terror, as an explosion of sorts turned out to be his liberation. An explosion of the wires and circuits and strange magical talismans and other black magic ritualistic charms. Rev didn’t know it until he was out of it all, until he was free from the purgatory that was the soul snare. He felt whole again, like he was his old self and not shackled down by an oppressive force that seemed to grow stronger the more he fought against it. He was gratified to be free, but he was also uncertain as to what exactly had happened.
He was uncertain until he saw, before him, among the confusion of wires and roots that was once his prison, Katherine’s delicate and mournful face.
“Katherine,” he whispered, as if it would do any good after she had caused such a clamor breaking apart the soul snare. “Do you realize what you’ve done?”
“I did what I had to do.”
“But you’ve just put yourself in danger, Katherine. What happens when your husband finds out? What happens when Hatman finds out?”
“I don’t care,” she threw herself into his arms, which had materialized solely to catch her from falling. His was a reluctant chivalry, performed with only the woman’s wellbeing in mind. But she was so affectionate, so willing to show him her true emotions that he couldn’t help being moved. He held her and she gazed lovingly into his eyes. “You don’t deserve what Ron and that power hungry sorcerer have in mind for you. I can’t let them do it. I-I can’t.”
Rev knew Abby would be hurt if she found out, but Katherine needed him at that moment. She needed his strength, his masculine embrace. He threw out all inhibitions, forgot all about everything and everyone else for that brief moment. He was grateful, above all of his reticence and fear of reprisals, and chose to express that gratitude by kissing Katherine’s lips.
It was about to happen. The moment had almost arrived. Their lips were inches apart and closing the distance rapidly when Ruby appeared precisely in front of Rev’s face.
“Ruby!” He actually jumped with a start. If he had a heart it would have shot out of his chest. “Dammit! You scared the hell out of me!”
She giggled throatily in a high pitch discernible only by dogs and dolphins.
“What is that?” Katherine asked breathlessly, her eyes still dreamy.
“It’s just Ruby,” Rev said, coming to his senses. What was he thinking? Kissing another woman? He had sworn to Abby those days were over, and he meant it. Old habits, he guessed. “Ruby, let’s get Brutus. We’ve got a mission to complete.”
Chapter 23
Morris didn’t mind being slugged in the gut so much. Abdominal pain was tolerable to a point, and contusions he could handle. He didn’t care that they hit him in the face, either. His cheeks were swollen and one eye was going to be blackened. They even threatened to break a kneecap if he didn’t cooperate. But none of that mattered because no amount of bodily harm, no amount of humiliation could compare to what they were doing to his statmag emitter.
They weren
’t destroying it per se, or wantonly tearing it apart with no purpose. They were tearing it apart all right, yet with a clear design on how to replicate, rebuild, and repurpose it in their sick and twisted agenda. One man with heavy magnifier lenses on his glasses peered into the circuitry, poring over the technology Morris had been nurturing along for years, technology he had inherited from the master, Emile Petrovic. He knew the man in the coke bottle lenses recognized the handiwork. He also knew this man was ancient.
“Vat eez zis?” the man spoke with a distinct German accent, indicating the quantum spectrometer. It was a crucial component of his statmag emitter, one that he noticed The Singulate was missing in their soul snare technology. The old man, seeing Morris had no intention on talking, stood rather quickly, his ruddy jowls quivered and reddened. “I said vat eez zis!” he swung his rigid arm and immediately a large goon, previously standing by, drove his fist into Morris’s solar plexus. For the third time in the last twenty minutes he had the wind knocked out of his lungs.
When he came to his senses, the flabby old German was dabbing Morris’s mouth with a warm cloth. Then he gave Morris a sip of pleasant green tea with lemon and honey. It was a taste of luxury Morris knew had all the earmarks of a pleasurable enticement, as opposed to the excruciating alternative. The tea was the carrot, the beating was the stick, and Morris was supposed to be smart enough to choose the former.
The problem was he knew his cooperation with these people would be the death nail to the whole operation. Not only the failure of their mission and the end of them all, but quite possibly the end of the balance of power in the supernatural world forever. Morris had an apercu of the highest order. In layman’s terms, he got it. The Singulate was after Ghost Guard all along. They wanted Ghost Guard to come. And they wanted Ghost Guard there for one reason—Morris.
They wanted him. They wanted his professional acumen. Most of all they wanted his intimate knowledge of Petrovic’s technology. Probably, he conjectured, they had been watching him for some time, though how he had no clue. When someone wanted something and had the money to get it, that money talked. Bribery and corruption knew no bounds when enough cash was at stake. And The Singulate had money. If there was anything they had besides an insidious desire for power, it was money.
“Vee can be nice, or vee can be not so nice. It’s all up to you.” The giant, ruddy Rheinlander affected a change in temperament that could have won an academy award. He was playing the part of the good cop and the bad cop and was doing a fine, if not schizophrenic, job of it. “If you vish to cooperrrrate (he rolled his r’s like a BMW 320i) and be nice to us, zen vee shall be nice to you. That’s the vay it verks avound here, and that’s the vay it vill be, ya?”
Morris had a hard time keeping a straight face. In the heart of a madhouse, beset by maniacal scientists, with his friends facing their ultimate demise, he felt the compulsion to laugh out loud at this throwback from when Operation Paperclip was in full play. Back then the US was stealing as many Nazi geniuses as possible and smuggling them out of Germany on the eve of the Third Reich’s collapse. This man fit the description perfectly. As old as dirt, as creepy as they come, and sinister to the core.
“Do you find zomezing amuzing, Mister Crafton?”
It didn’t surprise Morris that they knew his real name. It was just a matter of time before someone with the resources and the connections was going to slither into the system, corrupt it for their own nefarious needs, and come after Ghost Guard. They were at the frontlines of the real war. If the general populace only knew.
“No,” he straightened his face. “Not at all.”
“Good. Zen vee have an understanding. You listen and I vill talk and you vill zen tell me zee answers to vat I vant to know. AND YOU VILL TELL ME!”
The calm, magnanimous old man disappeared, replaced by his polar opposite. It was becoming more and more clear that if Morris didn’t cooperate, his own health was at risk. With a deep breath he pondered it, and decided it was worth it. He could never do this. He could never give anything that could further their evil plans.
“Do to me what you want,” Morris winced. “I’ll never help you.”
The ancient scientist widened his eyes with a flash of rage, then, slowly, affected his other persona, smooth and calm and cool and sweet as pie.
“Oh, but you vill. You see, vee have zumzing you might be interested in. Vee have your frrrriends. But more zan zat, vee have your idol, your god, a man you describe in your journals as your mentor.” Morris’s stomach churned with anxious bile. The scientist saw the concern in his eyes and came aglow with malicious glee. “Vee’ve been vatching you. Vee know everyzing zere iz to know about Ghost Guard. Vee are The Singulate. Vee have more money than God. And more power…earthly power. Soon Vee vill have more unearthly power. And zat’s vere you come in, Mister Crafton.”
“I thought as much,” Morris examined the array of specs, blueprints, working models, and random parts. “I see what you’re trying to do here, but your methodology. It’s all wrong,” he stepped back from his harsh assessment for a broader approach, and this time it did impress his creative side. Though the spirit snare technology was a rudimentary variation of Petrovic’s designs, he saw the genius in the alterations and the direction they were trying to go. “But I must admit to a bit of envy on my part. You do have a brilliant idea. I mean, the hybrid design has its advantages. It’s just the Petrovic coils. You have them incorrectly aligned. But the use of the technology is impressive.”
“If you sink zat is impressive, zen you might like zis,” the rotund scientist motioned toward an area of the prodigious work table Morris had previously not noticed. There was a large white tablecloth covering a square device, and when the old man pulled the cloth away, Morris lost his ability to breathe.
The aged scientist snapped his fingers in front of Morris’s eyes. That did the trick, bringing him back to reality from that inspired dreamland where the unthinkable becomes thinkable, the unreachable becomes reachable, and the unattainable comes true. That feeling of euphoric inventiveness had another side. A price was to be paid. Morris winched with the cognitive dissonance of pure joy at such a technological marvel, and at the same time utter terror over the use of such a strangely and potentially devastating device. Right away he knew the implications…and didn’t care. He thought of the Manhattan Project, and how drunk with mad ingenuity those men were, and how that intoxication was an irresistible elixir.
Morris didn’t want to look. He turned his head and averted his eyes, yet had no choice but to turn back. It was a force much stronger than fear or disgust. It was his intrigue. He had to know, had to see how this devastating contraption was put together, and, most of all, had to discover if it was the machine he thought it was.
One glance and it was confirmed.
“You did it. You actually built one. I’ve read about them. Petrovic even postulated about them, but never had I even dreamt of building one myself. It’s insane. It’s unwholesome. It’s an abomination. It’s—”
“It’s a miracle of science,” the old German said. “It will give us zee unparalleled ability to control zee forces of darkness. Demons and jinn and all other manner of evil beings all at our disposal.”
“I-I…”
“Let me guess, Mister Crafton. Never in your vildest imagination did you dream it could be done. Vell, it has been done…and it hasn’t.”
Morris cocked his head and squinted, his glasses fell on the bridge of his nose. He pressed them back up. “Explain please.” His mind yearned for input.
“Vat I mean is zat zee machine needs your inventive and crafty touch, pardon the pun.”
“So this was the reason for your ruse? You need me to finish your Controller.”
“Precisely!” the scientist’s eyes took on the shape of half-moons. “Only you’re half right. Vee vant you to finish building our Controller, yes. But you were wrong about your friends. Vee vant zem as well. You see, a spirit, or ghost, is nothing more z
an a collection of energy. And ze more powerful ze ghost, ze more energy it contains. The Singulate is in possession of many of history’s most powerful souls, either in creativity, in talent, in intelligence, or in strength of will. Zeese souls are people you might have heard of.”
“What does that mean?” Morris demanded. “You’ve been holding the spirits of luminaries and leaders?”
“Political leaders, leading thinkers, authors, scientists, ze best minds exude ze most power. You of all people should know zat.”
Morris began calculating the energy reserves in a spirit, and how that could be converted into practical electricity. The thought both chilled him to the bone and excited his intellectual properties to the point of overload.
“That’s right, Mister Crafton,” the scientist seemed to see the revelation in Morris’s eyes. “Vee can convert a spirit into serviceable, safe, and clean energy. And not just energy, but supercells capable of powering our controller for years and years. Zee more powerful the spirit, the more energy vee can get from it.”
Morris took no time with his assessment, an unequivocal, “You’re insane,” which may have been a little too hasty, given the fact that as soon as he said it, he got another haymaker to his midsection.
“Nine,” said the scientist. “Vee shall not be busting the young man’s chops any longer. He can and vill make up his mind on his own,” the man seized upon the moment and achieved severe eye contact. It seemed the Jekyll/Hyde transformation had taken place once again, and the good guy was taking over. “You vill make the right decision, von’t you?”
Morris breathed in softly, folding his hands over the spot where he’d been stricken. He swore a rib was cracked, but that was nothing compared to what would happen to him if he didn’t cooperate fully. He didn’t know for sure, but whatever they had in store must have been horrible.
He surveyed the challenges laid out before him. Even if he wanted to help these crazy people, he wasn’t sure if it could be done.
Ghost Guard 2: Agents of Injustice Page 17
